


Desperate Measures

by Storynerd



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel, Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor (Movies)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-22
Updated: 2013-09-22
Packaged: 2017-12-27 07:57:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/976349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Storynerd/pseuds/Storynerd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Desperate times call for desperate measures. Being stuck in Asgard, with no way back, is pretty desperate as times go. And releasing Loki from his cage? If that's not drastic action, Tony doesn't know what is. It's almost certain to blow up in his face.</p><p>He only considers it because he has no other options.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Desperate Measures

**Author's Note:**

> Credit where credit is due: 
> 
> Inspired by (and some dialogue clipped from) [this amazing gifset](http://lostiel.tumblr.com/post/58953168857/) by lostiel
> 
> Beta by the lovely [downmoon](http://downmoon.tumblr.com/), who did a nice job of tidying up the messier bits of this and very kindly didn't laugh at me for using 'taught' instead of 'taut'

Tony has a problem.  

He’s okay admitting this to himself, if not to anyone else, because it’s the first step to solving it and all that. However, in this case, he thinks he probably should have advanced past the _admitting_ stage and on to the _actually doing something about it_ part a little faster.

You see, his problem is this: once he knows something can be done, he _has_ to find a way to do it. Bonus points if whatever it is seems to be impossible, because what’s life without a little challenge? The thing is, the impossibility starts to become a bigger issue when, say, the idea in question is inter-dimensional travel. He’s seen it done, seen people disappear into a vibrant blur of blue light into realms unknown. So that means it’s possible, right? And if it’s possible, he can do it.

That’s the theory, anyway. The _seeming_ impossibility is only a minor issue. Except, right now, it’s advanced from being a minor issue and more into a life-threatening catastrophe.

Tony finds himself falling through an expanse of space, stars whirling dizzily around him, locked into a suit which is less a flying machine and more a deadweight, dragging him downward. It’s not responding; the controls are frozen, jammed tight by the ice snaking across the surface. The cold seeps in as the heating system sputters weakly. Tony feels his breath freezing in front of him. He’s still breathing, at least. The seals are holding. So far.

“Fuck fuck fuck _fuck fuck,_ ” he chokes out, twisting desperately in an attempt to slow his fall. “JARVIS, if I make it out of this alive _we are seriously talking about when to stop me doing things._ ”

There’s no response, just a weak beeping as the heads-up display fuzzes out into a snow of static, jittering wildly before clearing, danger alerts painted across it. _SYSTEM FAILURE_ flashes in front of his eyes like a strobe light. The status-indicator’s awash with red, showing the locked joints, lifeless repulsors, faltering life support. There’s a rushing noise outside, like air passing. Wait. Air? He turns, rolling over so he can look below him.

 Everything’s still spinning, but Tony catches a flash of gold as he twists over, plunging downward. Then, impossibly, an ocean hanging in space, glittering with reflected starlight, edges boiling away into mist as the water pours over the edge. A slash of rainbow, ruler-straight across the water’s surface, shining bright enough to see from the sky. Gleaming spires, towering up above the city below.

Asgard.

 _He’s actually done it._ He would laugh under any other circumstances. He’s made the jump between worlds, sent himself from one dimension to another using nothing but his own technology. The part where he ends up dying painfully, crushed against the ground after this endless fall, kind of puts a dampener on his celebration. At least it’ll make for a good story, if it ever filters back across the worlds to home. Truly going out in a blaze of glory. There’s no Hulk to catch him this time, as he plummets out of the sky, no sign of Thor coming to sweep him out of the sky, and he’s incredibly, horribly awake, able to watch as the choppy waves of that bizarre sea grow closer, riding up to meet him. He can’t do anything to stop it, suit still unresponsive around him, JARVIS silent in his ear. At this speed, the collision’s going to be like hitting concrete. There’s no way he’ll survive. He tries the controls again, futilely, _desperately._ Nothing. Try again. Again. _Again_.

Then there’s a cough, a shower of sparks, a tug at his left hand, another at his foot, then a roar as the repulsors engage in a flare of fire, all four firing simultaneously. The uncontrollable drop out of the sky slows, slows, and he _whoops_ as he flattens out into a swoop, flashing across the surface of the water, kinetic energy from the fall propelling him forward The adrenaline surges through him: this, _this_ is what he lives for, the knife-edge of danger, the hairline crack between _brilliant_ and _deadly._ Oh, he’s good, he’s _so damn good -_  

And, in a fabulous display of the troubles with hubris, the repulsors cut out, all at once, into sudden silence. He’s left with no steering, and no brakes, on a collision course with a wall looming in front of him. It looks very solid, thick stone slabs and iron bars, and very unavoidable. He’s going to plough straight through it. He only has time to think _oh, shit,_ and half-curl to protect himself, twisting to shield the dimension-jumper clamped to the chest plate, before the wall fills his vision and blocks out the light and –

\- he opens his eyes, and regrets it pretty much right away. He can feel his head, a low throb behind his eyes that promises the beginnings of a concussion, and his body aches all over from losing the fight with the wall. The suit grinds awkwardly as he pushes himself up to sitting, mechanical joints protesting with a worrying _crunch_. The paintwork’s scarred by deep scratches, and the panelling’s dented in all down the right side. The right arm’s resisting movement in a way that says the servos are shot. He clutches a hand against his chest in a sudden panic, but, thank god, the arc reactor’s still glowing blue, and the dimension-jumper clamped above it looks like it’s still in one piece. He glances up at the room he’s crash landed in, and realises he’s not alone. There’s someone watching him. Someone who is far too familiar for his liking.

“Well, well,” Loki says, smirking in a way that makes Tony want to punch him right in his smug mouth. “Tony Stark. You _do_ enjoy making an entrance, don’t you?”

Tony struggles up onto his feet, heaving the suit up with him, before tugging at the release switch on the outside. Luckily, it seems to be functioning enough to understand the action, even if JARVIS is still absent, and the metal obligingly folds itself back, letting him step out. The shoulder section sticks on the right-hand side, and he vaguely remembers turning to present that to the wall first. He twists slightly to edge out past the jammed panel, feeling the edge scrape across his skin, snagging at the bodysuit he’s wearing underneath. When he breathes in, he can smell dust and old stone, clammy air.

“Loki,” he says in reply, once he’s out and can actually get a good look at the god, lounging against the far wall of the cell. “Can’t say I’ve missed you. Nice glass house, by the way. Do they let people in to gawk on special occasions? Or is this just for the guards’ voyeuristic tastes?”

Loki’s lip curls. “I believe _that_ pathetic excuse for punishment is reserved for your own cells, if I remember my time on board your flying ship.” He tips his head back against the wall, eyes roaming the ceiling. If Tony’s honest, he kind of looks like shit; clothes battered, skin even paler under the dirt, hair a wild, unwashed snarl. He looks small without his armour, dressed just in pants - _leather again, seriously? –_ and an undershirt which really only confirms the theory that he’s allergic to anything not green. The attitude doesn’t seem to have changed much, though.

“So you’re just here to stew, then? I was hoping for something a little more dramatic. You know, chains, cockroaches, maybe rats, that sort of thing.” He’d thought about it, of course, in the year since the attack on New York: what were they doing to Loki back in Asgard? What would have happened to him? Was he still alive, could he ever come back? He’d put some of those worries out of his mind recently, but here’s the living proof in front of him that those fears weren’t entirely unfounded. He can only hope the Asgardian version of the glass jail cell works better than the SHIELD version did.

Loki leans forward to look at him better. “You took a long journey just to see me rot in this cell.” He smiles as he says it, lazy, dangerous.

“What can I say, I had make sure the rumours were true.” By _rumours_ , of course, he means _wild speculations,_ but he doesn’t have to tell Loki that. “Your hair did get even worse,” he says in lieu of something else, like, _why did I have to crash here of all places?_

Loki rolls his eyes back up to look at the ceiling, like Tony’s very presence is some kind of huge strain on his patience. “I’m sure this will surprise you, but personal appearance doesn’t take priority when the only people to see you are the palace guards once a day.”

Tony blinks, caught off-guard. “Wait, what? No family bonding time? Your brother not popping in to say a quick hello every now and again?”

Loki’s jaw tenses, teeth gritting together as he swings his gaze back to Tony. “Visiting prisoners is beneath the crown prince,” he says, sharp, venom-filled. “He would not wish to dirty himself with the sight of me.”

“He hasn’t visited you at all?” Tony pushes, stepping closer to the glass wall between them to get a better look in.

Loki slams his fist into the glass, suddenly, gold flaring in an intricate pattern under his hand, and Tony didn’t even see him stand up, didn’t see him move from the bench he was slumped on, until he was _there,_ opposite him, nearly nose-to-nose across the thin barrier, face contorted into a snarl. “He has _left me,”_ he spits out as the gold fades. “Left me to sit here, in solitude, unable to _face me_ since my trial, refusing to look at what _he caused_.” He drops his hand away, pushes back, starts to pace across the cell. It’s not far; maybe eight, nine paces across, less than that front to back.

“They kept you in here all this time?” Tony asks, and he doesn’t like how that sits. _Kept underground, in the dark, against his will, for long, long stretches of time._ It’s far too familiar.

“And he believes it _merciful_ ,” Loki says, quiet and deadly, turning his back, rolling his neck and stretching out his arms, all restless energy. “He believes that staying penned up like an animal, like a _beast_ , is preferable to a quick, clean death. That should have been my punishment, for the treason I committed,” he adds, flippantly, half-turning his head to catch Tony’s reaction. Tony meets his eyes, stare flat.

“You think you don’t deserve this?”

“I think I would have preferred the axe,” Loki says, turning towards him again. “A definite end, rather than this… eternity of waiting.”

“Guess that makes it the perfect punishment then,” Tony snaps back, rattled. “Don’t let me interrupt your busy schedule of brooding now.” He slides his way back into the suit, sealing it closed, and powers up the dimension-jumper. It fires up with a smooth whir, and he takes a second to relish the fact that it’s undamaged before he hits the ‘initiate’ button, starting the sequence to gather enough energy to propel him across the realms. Lights flicker across the surface, building into a multi-hued swirl, getting brighter, brighter –

Then there’s a sudden static spark, a flash, and the lights disappear.

_Fuck._

Tony taps it hopefully, but there’s no response. _Fuck fuck fuck._

“Having trouble?” Loki asks, one eyebrow half-raised, leaning against the glass front of the cage.

“Can it, crazy-eyes.” Tony released the jumper from its magnetic clamps, holding it up to examine it more closely. It _looks_ fine, which is bad. If it looked broken, at least it would give him a place to start.

“If you wish,” Loki says. “Does that mean you would prefer to not know how long it will take the guards to discover you here, then?”

Tony takes a second to close his eyes and breathe deeply, fingers tightening on the device in his hand in frustration. “What?” he asks, opening his eyes and flipping the faceplate up so he can see better.

“Well, given your… hasty entrance, I’m assuming you didn’t come here under the Allfather’s power, or past the guardian Heimdall. That in itself can be taken as an indicator of ill intent. Asgard does not look well on trespassers.”

“What do you mea – I’m not _trespassing,_ ” Tony says. “I’m just passing by. Anyway, Thor will vouch for me not being a crazy genocidal vagrant. No offence or anything.”

Loki’s mouth tips up at the corner. “Of course. I’m sure when he returns he will ensure this is all sorted out correctly. It would be nice to have company down here for a few weeks.”

“I’m going to go ahead and assume this is just some weird joke on your part,” Tony says, turning his attention back to the jumper. _Thor’s not here?_

“Trespass is taken very seriously here,” Loki says, stepping close to the glass, resting his fingertips against the surface. “You are fortunate that Heimdall’s gaze is fixed on Thor while he is leading our forces, or you would have been discovered already. Imprisonment would be lenient for one who comes armed as you do. Tell me, did you bear witness to the Destroyer’s time on Midgard?”

Tony levels a stare at him. This has to be some kind of mind game, surely. “I did. Quite a fireworks display, if you’d like a professional opinion. Can’t see it happening to me, though.”

“Mm. Perhaps, perhaps not,” Loki says, shrugging easily. He watches Tony poking at the dimension-jumper for a few minutes in silence. “How will you return to Earth?” he asks at last, eyes tracking over the frown creased in between Tony’s eyes.  “The Bifrost is yet to be fully repaired, you know. The Allfather must reserve his energies to recall Thor from Vanaheim. Mortals cannot be permitted to reside in Asgard.”

“Thank you for the portrait of doom and gloom,” Tony says, shoving the jumper back into its clamps on his chest with a little more force than necessary. He looks up to glare at Loki. “What do you suggest instead, then, seeing as you seem to know everything? Surrendering now? Drowning myself in the physically impossible ocean outside? Waiting here until the guards catch me to provide you with some entertainment?”

Loki grins wide, teeth bared, leaning closer. “I propose a deal,” he says, pressing his hands harder against the glass, sending gold flaring under his touch again.

“With you? No way.”

“Hear me out first,” he says, stare steady, hypnotic. “Release me from this cage and – ” he ignores Tony’s strangled protest – “ _And,_ I will return you to your Earth, safe and well.”

“Do you think I’m insane?” Tony blinks at him. “Do you really think I’m just going to bust you out of your little glass box and let you go running off to cause whatever trouble you want? Also, you’d _take me home?_ Please.”

“I would be indebted to you,” Loki counters. “Releasing me is a high ask. To take you back to Midgard would be a small price to pay in return.”

“Yeah, since you’d probably be on your way there anyway to a _ttack it_. How would you even get there?”

Loki breathes out a faint sigh. “Do you think me so keen to find myself in a cage again? I am capable of learning from my errors, Stark.  And there are more ways between the worlds than those the Allfather uses.”

Tony wavers, just for a moment. He needs a way home. He _really_ needs to not be shut up in an Asgardian prison cell. Loki must read this on his face because he crowds even closer – and when the hell did Tony get this close to the glass? They’re only a foot apart, Loki towering over him from his elevated perch, leaning on the cell wall like he can just push his way through to freedom.

“I’ll only offer once,” he says softly. He’s almost smiling, eyes vivid green in the dim light of the room, focused directly on Tony. Then, as if on an afterthought, he adds, “I wouldn’t deliberate too long. The guards will be here in ten minutes to check on me.”

Tony looks away, watching motes of dust dance in the light from the hole in the wall he created, weighing his options. None of them are exactly ideal. Getting arrested in Asgard might risk interdimensional war. Releasing Loki risks interdimensional Loki, which is nearly as bad. Being imprisoned – or worse, killed – isn’t exactly top of his to-do list. Returning home _is._

 _I’m going to regret this so much,_ he thinks, before turning back to the cage, meeting Loki’s eyes. “Deal,” he says.

Loki smiles, not the wide, crazed expanse of teeth, just a small twist of lips, and nods gracefully. “A deal it is, then. Release me.”

“Uh.” Tony taps an armoured finger against the glass, watching the gold ripple out from the centre in fractal patterns, dissipating almost immediately. “How?”

“You are the expert in destruction,” Loki counters, gesturing vaguely. “I’m sure you’ll find a way.”

“Right.” Tony knocks on the glass a little harder. “Is this just to counter physical attacks?”

“It’s mostly to prevent magical escape.” Loki traces a finger across the surface. “Its effects weaken me. It won’t break under the force I can manage at the moment.”

“Huh. Well, force is kind of my area.”

 

* * *

 

 

“Okay, so this is kind of going to be noisy and life threatening. Might want to stand back a little.”Tony finishes suiting up, sliding the faceplate down again.

Loki casts his eyes across the network of charges fixed to the glass before moving back. Tony’s stripped out the explosive cores of half his ammunition, and that’d better be enough because he doesn’t fancy strolling around unarmed with the god of mischief, probably being hunted by various Asgardian guards for trespassing, being a threat to the kingdom, and, oh yeah, jail-breaking a dangerous criminal.

He shakes his head instead of vocalising this, and steps back himself, putting a good fifteen feet between him and the cage. He doesn’t want to get impaled by flying glass shards, thank you. He raises his arm and readies the missile. “Right. Here goes nothing.”

He fires.

The missile kicks against his arm as it takes off, sparking and hissing, trailing exhaust fumes behind it. It strikes the glass wall, dead centre.

The world flashes white.

The crash rattles in Tony’s ears, loud enough to shake him even as the shockwave pushes him back a few feet. He stumbles, only just keeping his balance against the force of the explosion, nearly crumpling under the noise. He blinks a couple times to clear his eyes, watching as the dust swirls in the air, thick, choking. The smell leaks in through the filters on the suit: smoke, hot metal. The roar of sound fades away. Over the ringing in his ears, Tony can just hear the faint chinking of shards of glass dropping to the floor. Sunlight slants in from the hole in the wall, cutting wide gold beams in the thick air, obscuring everything into a haze of light.

Then there’s a scuffling noise, like a slide of glass pieces against each other, and Loki looms through the smoke, backlit by the glow of the remaining walls of the cage. There’s a wickedly sharp shard of glass in his hand, and he strokes a finger across the edge, a caress.

“This feels so much _better,_ ” he says, rolling his shoulders. “My thanks, Stark. I couldn’t have done that on my own.”

“Yeah, great – ” Tony starts, keeping his eyes on the glass in Loki’s hand, and then he hears a shout from outside.

“Mm, that probably did attract a little attention.” Loki flicks a hand towards the door, and it flares briefly with gold light before fading. He tosses the glass onto the floor, where it shatters into a splash of glittering shards. “Perhaps we should be going now.”

“Going where? You’re going to zap me back home, or what?”

“I need time to prepare for that.” Loki glances at the door. “And currently I don’t _have_ time.”

“Hey.” Tony levels a repulsor at Loki. “You said you’d take me home.”

“Yes, but I didn’t say _when_.” The door shakes with a sudden impact. Loki walks over to the hole in the outer wall where Tony had come crashing through, picking his way through the scattered dust and broken stones. “Either you can stay here and be captured by Odin’s guards, or you can follow me. Which will it be?”

Tony deliberates for about half a second before stepping over to join him, kicking aside some of the rubble with a clatter. “Pass on the guards. One high-velocity meeting with the wall was enough.”

“As you wish.” Loki steps out through the wall onto the platform outside that leads down into the water. Tony follows, stumbling slightly as the suit grinds awkwardly in places. It feels like some of the motors are malfunctioning; every time he tries to step his left foot forwards, it sticks for a half-second before obeying. He edges through the hole, and glances around. The narrow platform runs along the edge of the wall, hemmed in on the other side by the ocean that laps gently at the stone. The water glitters in the sunlight, dissipating into mist in the far distance. He remembers seeing it plunging off into space, and shakes his head against the weirdness of it all. _Magic. Crazy._

Loki’s waiting for him, head tipped back, blinking his eyes briefly closed against the sunlight. It throws his face into sharp relief, shadows pooling under his eyes and below his cheekbones. He looks gaunt, drawn, but there’s something like satisfaction curling at his mouth, easing out the tension in his shoulders.

“So, TomTom, where’s our destination?” Tony clanks over to him, boots loud against the stone flooring.

Loki raises an eyebrow, turning his head to look at him, but answers anyway. “To return you to your realm, I need to be uninterrupted. There are woods to the north of the city; they should provide sufficient shelter for the time being. I trust you can find north on your own?”

“On my – wait, no, what do you mean – ”

“Good luck avoiding the guards, Stark,” Loki says, with a grin, and then he just… fades from view, like a photo caught in sunlight, paling to translucent, transparent, then – nothing.

“Loki? God fucking damn it – Loki, g _et back here.”_ It doesn’t have much of an effect, of course. There’s another crash from inside the prison he’s just stepped out of; the guards must be trying to batter down the door. He edges out of the sight-line of the gap in the wall. He doesn’t really have many options. Yelling won’t bring Loki back, of course. Nor will threats, no matter how much Tony wants to act on them. And staying here isn’t an option; the guards are going to be through the door soon, and he doesn’t fancy being caught by them. If trespassing got you the thrown-in-jail punishment (or, if Loki’s not just bullshitting him about the Destroyer, _total annihilation_ ), he doesn’t like to think what letting insane war criminals out of their cells would get you. Probably a long, slow death.

The HUD is flickering sporadically inside his helmet, and JARVIS is noticeably absent. Still, the suit can respond to voice commands autonomously. “Open compass,” he says, enunciating clearly and hoping that Asgardian north is the same as that on Earth. There’s a pause, and then the compass appears in the left-hand corner of his vision. It’s pointing to _something,_ which is a relief. If it’s not what Loki meant by north… well, he’ll just have to cross that bridge when he comes to it. He steps forward a little so he’s clear of the wall, and activates the repulsors.

Or, he tries to.

They spark weakly, spitting out faint trails of exhaust fumes before sputtering into silence. “Ah, fuck,” he says, and tries again. This time there’s not even a hint of activity, just silence, and definitely no lift.

There’s another crash from the room on the other side of this wall.

“Loki,” he says, voice low, “When I catch up to you, I’m going to _strangle you.”_

He turns, following the compass point to a vaguely northern direction, and starts walking along the edge of the sea.

 

* * *

 

 

Two hours later, and Tony’s sweating straight through the bodysuit he’s wearing under his armour. He didn’t get a good look at whatever sun Asgard might have while he was spinning through space, but whatever it was like, it doesn’t seem to be setting any time soon. The light’s unchanging; everything is still washed in the same golden glow as when he first arrived. It’s really starting to get on his nerves.

It’s been a long walk from the edge of the sea towards the hypothetical woods Loki had mentioned. It feels even longer with the suit weighing down on him, dragging against his movements, leaving his muscles aching and his skin raw where the edges dig in. it might be an elegant machine in the air, but it’s really not designed for walking around in for extended periods of time. He’ll have to change that when he gets home. If. _When._

At last, there are trees up ahead. They’ve been visible for about half an hour now, but he’s almost there. Luckily, the route he took seemed to be fairly unpopulated, even after he left the platform that ran along the shore, and he didn’t come face-to-face with any guards. Or anyone, for that matter. It’s a relief, because he’s really not sure what he’d do in that situation. Pretend to be lost and hope that confidence could carry him through, probably. He’s done something similar in worse situations. That doesn’t mean he wants the chance to try the technique out, though.

He makes it to the shade of the trees at last, and it’s a relief after the relentless light of the past few hours. The golden spires of Asgard may be impressive to look at, but they sure aren’t helpful to those with headaches, or a desire to lurk in dark shadows. Maybe gods didn’t get headaches, but lurking in shadows had to be universal across all realms, right? He ducks under a low branch, and into the gloom under the tree cover. The light’s softer here; everything looks lush and green, with a mottling of light and shade splashed across the ground. It would be pretty, if he wasn’t kind of in the middle of something. He keeps walking, following the compass in the HUD. Loki didn’t say where in the woods, so north seems like the best bet for the time being. After a couple minutes, the light fades as the canopy grows thicker. Low bushes slow his progress down, tangling around his feet as he tries to pass. One plant has wicked spikes to it, an inch long and sharp enough to score narrow lines into the paintwork on his calves. It’s cooler in here as well, with a damp, earthy smell that starts to filter in. He wonders if the whole of Asgard used to look like this, before the dazzling buildings of the city were created. It’s… quiet, except for the tramping of his feet and the rush of his breath, loud inside the helmet. There’s not even any birdsong.

“You took your time,” someone says, and Tony’s halfway into cardiac arrest before he registers that it’s just Loki, folding himself out of a shadow on his left like he’s been there the entire time, and not a ghost or something. Loki casts an eye across him, and grins. “Did you walk here?”

“Can’t fly anymore,” Tony grinds out, fighting the urge to punch Loki right in that smug smile. He flips up the faceplate. “Fucking space’ll do that to your costume.” He takes a closer look. “Speaking of costumes, did you stop to c _hange?”_ Loki’s back in his leather and metal outfit, the tattered clothes from the cell gone. His hair’s still a mess, though.

“You never know when you might need armour, Stark,” Loki says, still looking amused. “I had wondered what had happened to you.”

“Yeah, thanks, by the way, for leaving me to find my own way here. No way I could have gotten caught by the guards, or anything. I’d totally have sold you out, too.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt it.” Loki falls into step beside him as they walk deeper into the woods. “I would do the same in your position. I was counting on you having the wit to avoid capture. And here you are.”

“Mm.” Tony’s pretty sure that was almost a compliment, but he still kind of wants to rip Loki to pieces for that stunt. “So am I getting my ticket home soon, or what?”

“What, I’m afraid,” Loki says, before stopping and turning to face him as he slows down to match. “Pass me your device.”

“Um, no,” Tony says, raising a hand to cover the dimension-jumper still clamped to his chest. “See, there’s this little thing I like to pride myself on called _not handing advanced technology over to murdering space wizards._ ”

Loki fixes him with a flat look. “Give it to me, or I will take it by force. It is of no use to you anyway, now that it’s broken.”

“Then what do _you_ want it for?”

“I wish to study it. If I know the route you took to get here, it will be easier to find a way back.”

Tony narrows his eyes at him. Loki matches the look for a few seconds before huffing out an exasperated breath and holding out a hand. “Give it to me. If you want my help, you will have to obey my instructions. Start as you mean to go on, yes?”

Tony can feel his teeth grind together as his jaw tightens, but he reaches up to release the device from his chest and holds it out. “Don’t drop it,” he says, watching Loki’s fingers curl around it, holding it carefully. “If we’re going to pit stop here, I’m going to get a bit more comfortable,” he says, stamping down on the urge to use words to the effect of _I swear to god if I didn’t need you to get home I’d just blast your head off right now,_ or even, _I can see why everyone in Asgard hates you because you’re a royal pain in the ass,_ and activates the suit release. It folds back off him – shoulder still sticking, damn it – and he struggles out. The cool forest air is a relief after the sweaty inside of the suit, and he stretches his arms out and rolls his neck before he catches Loki watching him. “What?”

“I’m surprised you would leave yourself so vulnerable in front of me.” Loki’s gaze is steady, and Tony fights the urge to shift uncomfortably under it.

“I’m planning on letting you catapult me across interdimensional space,” Tony points out. “That kind of maxes out the risk factor.”

“My techniques are little more refined than _catapulting,_ ” Loki says disdainfully, before folding elegantly down onto a fallen tree. He turns the dimension-jumper over, tapping it lightly and holding it up to his eyeline. “You created this yourself?”

“You bet.” Tony settles next to him, keeping a couple feet clearance just in case. “I mean, some of the initial research may have been borrowed from SHIELD, but what they don’t know won’t hurt them. And I got a lot from scanning your departure last time you paid Earth a visit.”

Loki nods absently, running his fingertips gently across the surface of the glass-and-metal front plate. “And this is powered in the same way as that?” He gestures vaguely towards the arc reactor, glow faintly visible beneath Tony’s shirt.

“How did you know that?” Tony resists the urge to cover it with a hand. He feels… exposed by the way Loki’s looking at him.

“I can feel the energy.” Loki closes his eyes briefly, and his fingers take on a faint glow. “Hm. A crude method of travel, but effective, I suppose.”

“It was a first attempt,” Tony says, bristling slightly.

Loki raises an eyebrow but doesn’t reply. He carries on examining the jumper, running a magic-limned finger over the joins, tracing the connections. Tony watches him work, seeing the way he tips his head to the side when he’s considering something, the way his hair drops forward to hide the edges of his expression behind a screen of tangled black. He blends in with the surroundings, black and green fading into the undergrowth, and Tony wonders if he spent a lot of time here when he was younger, hiding out from the force of nature that is Thor.

“So,” Tony says, once the silence has stretched long enough to feel awkward. “How’re things with you, anyhow? Those murderous impulses still hanging around?”

Loki raises his eyebrows, which Tony takes as something of a small victory. “Your impudence could prompt a return, if you continue in this line of questioning.”

“Ah, come on, Gandalf, don’t be like that. It’s a legitimate question!” He’s pretty sure Loki’s joking. Like, 83% sure.

Loki doesn’t answer, shaking his head slightly as he looks back down at the dimension-jumper. Tony nudges him with a toe, trying to prompt a response.

“Honestly, though. Feeling the need to take over any worlds? Because a little warning would be nice, in that case.”

“Yes, because the last attempt ended so well for me.” Loki drops the device into his lap, patience running short.

“What, can’t go and hook up with your army buddies again?” Tony rests his hands on the trunk behind him so he can lean back, watching the way Loki’s expression clouds over.

“They were not mine,” Loki says. Tony goes to interrupt, but stops himself. If Loki wants to talk, he’s not going to object. “It was an exchange,” Loki continues. “My freedom, and the use of the Chitauri, and in return I would obey the orders given to me, and bring the Tesseract to its rightful owner. Given that I failed in my part of the deal, I don’t imagine they would offer me such a contract again, do you?”

“I guess not.” There’s something Loki’s avoiding, he can tell. “And what was that about your freedom?”

Loki pushes a hand through his hair, shoulders tight. “When I fell from the Bifrost, I landed in the hands of an entity by the name of Thanos. And once he has you in his grasp, he is not so fond of letting go.” He turns his eyes away from Tony, shutting down any further questions. Tony files the name away to look into later, tries a different tack:

“So if you had an army, you’d do it all again?”

“Regretting your decision so soon?” Loki asks, his hands curling around the jumper again, restless. “You can’t put me back in that cage, Stark.”

“I’m not actually big on caging people,” Tony says, ignoring the fact that yeah, he really can’t get Loki back into any kind of confinement. “Besides, after the stunt you pulled on the Helicarrier, I’d suspect being in a cage was all part of your plan the whole time.”

“So you _do_ possess the ability to learn, unlike Thor.” Loki smiles nastily. “Or perhaps you are simply less trusting. Agent Barton told me some interesting facts about you.”

“Oh yeah?” Tony feels tension clamp down across his shoulders. “I don’t really know the guy that well. You probably got the abridged version.”

“Nevertheless, it seems to be… sufficient. For one with such betrayal in his past, I’m surprised it didn’t take more persuasion for you to release me. You trust far more easily than I imagined.”

“Desperate times,” Tony bites out, feeling his anger rise again. “Believe me, it wouldn’t have been my first choice, if I’d had any.” Loki’s needled him, and he knows he shouldn’t give him the satisfaction of acting rattled. He can’t help it, though. Obie’s betrayal is a sore spot that hasn’t hardened over yet.

“Of course.” Loki looks far too amused by this. Tony knows he walked into that trap, let his emotions show too much. Loki considers him for a second more, then taps one finger against the dimension-jumper, sharply, and it lights up under his touch. Tony jumps up, reaching for it.

“How did you do that?”

Loki’s mouth lifts up at the corner, amused. “You don’t expect me to reveal all my secrets, surely?”

Tony snatches the device, looking over it again. It looks like it’s working fine, the light flickering under the surface, ready to go. All he needs to do is hit the trigger and he’ll be on his way home. “You actually helped me.”

“A deal is a deal,” Loki says, standing up. “Even for someone as dishonest as I am.”

“Huh. Thanks,” Tony says, stretching out again before backing into his armour, feeling it seal itself up around him. “So, hey, let’s never do this again.”

Loki’s lips twitch briefly. “A wise choice.”

Tony picks up the jumper, and then he hears a sharp _crack_ in the woods surrounding them. Loki’s head swings up, sudden, eyes narrowed.

“Guards.” His attention turns to Tony. “You should go.”

“I’m getting there.” He clamps the jumper to his chest. “Are you – ”

There’s another crash, close – very close – and a man in armour stumbles out of the undergrowth. He jerks to a stop on seeing the pair of them, then draws his sword.

“Stop!” he shouts.

“ _Go_ ,” Loki says, urgency slipping into his voice as he grips the dimension-jumper, squeezing it to activate the trigger. “And hope this is the last time you see me.”

“What – ” Tony starts to say. _What are you going to do?_

But then the ground drops out from under his feet, and he hangs motionless for a second, weightless, surrounded by nothingness on all sides. No light, no sound, no air, just endless velvet blackness, pressing in on him, s _uffocating –_

The darkness clears, resolves itself into an endless sea of stars hanging over a vast plane of snow and ice, and Tony has time to think, _that doesn’t look like Earth,_ before he plummets like a stone.

 

* * *

 

 

He wakes up, although he kind of wishes he hadn’t. The second he opens his eyes, pain stabs through his head, sharp and throbbing. _Right. Two concussions in a few hours._ He’s lying face down, and he takes a moment to steel himself before shoving up, rolling over onto his back. The movement jars him all over, and he takes a couple deep breaths to steady the spinning feeling in his brain before he opens his eyes to take a look around.

He’s not on Earth. He can gather that much from the ice wasteland he’s in, bathed in a weird blue half-light. Snow’s falling, leaving a spattering of white across the eyepieces of the suit. The HUD’s gone dark, and he suspects that the whole suit’s just given up on functionality for the time being. He can feel icy trickles of water leaking through the gaps between the back plates, soaking into his bodysuit. He’s not feeling that cold, but that’ll change pretty soon. His breath is frosting against the inside of the helmet. He grits his teeth, and twists the manual release on the outside of the suit. It opens up, jerkily, sticking awkwardly, and he flinches at the rush of frigid air. He pushes himself up, slowly, feeling the world pitch around him as he sways. His vision fogs, blurring across the edges, and his stomach lurches unpleasantly. He takes a moment just to breathe, feeling his head pound in sync with his heartbeat. _Not good,_ he thinks, trying to run over everything he knows about concussions. _Really not good._ Once the blurring has faded, leaving just a faint sparkling of white lights at the corners of his vision, he sits up fully to take a look at the damage.

The dimension-jumper has shattered.

He stares at it, waiting for his brain to catch all the way up. The casing’s broken right across the middle, shards of glass poking down into the inner mechanisms. It sparks pitifully, a faint flicker that dies even as he’s watching it. It’s beyond fixing, even for him, especially with no way to power it up again. The delicate components that had converted the arc reactor’s energy into the type needed to propel him across dimensions have snapped, fragile wires melted into each other. He shifts a little more upright, and a cascade of tiny wires, microchips and pieces of glass showers down onto his lap, blending into the snow in seconds. He cups a hand over the broken front plate, but it’s too late to hold it all together.

He flops back down, wincing as the sudden movement makes his head spin. He’s shivering now, cold starting to sink into his bones. He looks up at the dark sky, feeling his options for escape wither and die around him. He’s stuck, somewhere that’s not Earth, somewhere that’s not even populated as far as he can tell. There’s no way out of this one. He watches his breath plume white in the cold under the faint starlight. _What a way to go,_ he thinks. All he can hear is the wind howling across the deserted field of ice. Snowflakes dance in the sky, eddying and twisting before falling feather-light to rest on his skin. He shuts up the front of the suit again to keep the melted water off his skin, and the snow starts to accumulate immediately, settling on the frost-coated metal and sticking there.

Without the HUD, he has no way of knowing how long he was unconscious. He can see ice crystals edging across the metal panelling of the suit, fractal patterns spreading out like searching fingers, like leaves. It’s beautiful, even if it’s a sign of just how cold it is out there. He’s glad he lined the suit with padding; if it was metal the whole way through, he’s be stuck to it now like a kid licking a flagpole. It’s got to be conducting heat away from his skin too fast, but there’s not much he can do about that. Without the internal systems online, he can’t activate the heater. Not enough manual overrides. Well, he didn’t really plan for this when he was designing the suit.

 He doesn’t close the faceplate; he can’t see enough through just the eyeholes, even when they’re not iced over. He wants to keep his eyes open. Something about staying awake, about not giving in to the urge to sleep when you’re freezing. He feels like he’s come full-circle, really – the Mark II nearly killed him with ice. Now he’s brought this suit to a similar fate.

He’s stopped shivering. The cold seems to be receding. He knows that’s probably not good. His vision sparkles again, swinging in and out of focus. He closes his eyes, hoping it’ll steady the spinning in his head. They feel better closed anyway, when he’s not fighting the heaviness of his eyelids.

There’s a soft _whump_ of air next to him.

“Need a hand?”

He opens his eyes and sees Loki looking down on him, face impassive. “Please tell me you’re here to finish me off,” he says, blinking again, vision still tipping wildly. His left eye won’t focus properly. Loki smiles, and it’s not the smug, self-satisfied grin he’s used to seeing. It seems… softer, somehow.

“Not just yet,” he says, and crouches down next to him. Tony’s pretty sure he’s hallucinating due to hypothermia by this point, because he can see snowflakes sitting unmelted on Loki’s skin. Loki’s fingers come to rest gently on his forehead, and he has a brief moment of panic – _blue eyes mind control the last time he touched me he threw me out a window –_ before there’s a pulse of light, bright enough for him to close his eyes. When he opens them, his vision’s cleared, and his head’s stopped pounding.

“First Asgard, now Jotunheim,” Loki says, moving back a little. He doesn’t seem to be feeling the cold. “Is your aim to tour all of the Nine Realms on your way home?”

“That was the plan, but my car broke down,” Tony says, pushing himself up to sitting so they’re closer to an even level. He gestures at the shattered dimension-jumper. “Guess I’ll just take up ice-fishing as a hobby instead.” He blinks, testing his vision, but it remains steady. Huh. “What was that?”

“A little healing magic,” Loki says. “You mortals are so fragile.”

“Yeah? I’ll drop you out of space and through a couple of walls and see how _fragile_ you feel after that,” Tony bites out. Loki’s sharp, satisfied expression when he talked about Obie is still fresh in his mind, souring his mood. “Why are you here, anyway? Come to gloat over my misfortune?”

“Come to complete my part of the deal,” Loki says, pushing himself up to standing. “You’re not back home yet. Unless, of course, you’d prefer to take up residence with the Frost Giants.”

“Based on the total lack of nice giants in pretty much any legend, I may have to pass on that. Wait, there was that book about the BFG. That might not count. What are these giants like?” Tony can feel his tongue tripping on the words, cold blurring the edge of what he wants to say. Loki might have healed him, but it’s just reminded him of how cold it is out here, how much he needs to leave before his _fragile_ body starts to shut down around him.

“I wouldn’t recommend them,” Loki says, a little too lightly, and there’s tension in his jaw, in his fingers when they curl around Tony’s wrists, skin cold. “So I suggest you _move_.” And he pulls Tony up onto his feet, hauling him out of the open suit, exposing him to the freezing air. He jerks away, surprised, and steps out of the shell of his armour.

“Would it kill you to ask?” He takes another step back to put some distance between them. “Anyway, why should I believe you? You said you fixed the machine, and look where it got me.”He crouches down to start folding the suit up, collapsing it down into several large panels that he can stack on top of each other, pulling at it jerkily. “Or could you not resist messing with me because I _trusted_ you?” 

“I did not send you here intentionally,” Loki says, watching him. “Travelling the realms is not an exact science.” He pauses, then presses on, looking away to watch the snow swirl around them. “You would do well not to listen to everything that I say.”

“And what the hell is that supposed to mean?” Tony straightens up, and wishes he could stop shivering. “You made all that up, then?”

“No,” Loki says, still not looking at him. In the semi-darkness, he looks very pale, skin almost blue. He’s very still. Tony thinks, apropos of nothing, that Loki could almost be a sculpture: pale, beautiful, untouched by the elements around them. “Perhaps I would rather discuss other’ failings, rather than my own,” he says, at last.

Tony doesn’t have an answer to that, so he goes back to trying to stow the suit together. His fingers are clumsy with cold, and the metal bites against them, icy. He jerks his hands away before they can stick, cursing himself for trying something so stupid, and tries to nudge the plates into a pile with his foot instead. The light’s weak, washing everything out into shades of grey and blue, but he’s pretty sure he can see the skin on his fingertips starting to pale from the temperature.

“Leave it,” Loki says, moving closer again. “I don’t mean on _Jotunheim,_ ” he adds when Tony goes to protest. “I can transport it without you injuring yourself further.”

“You said we were moving.” Tony kicks the pile a little neater before giving up. He really doesn’t want to get frostbite off his own suit. He doesn’t want to give Loki the satisfaction of him hurting himself, either.

“Between the realms.” Loki flexes his fingers, rolls his shoulders like he’s preparing for a race. “Time for you to return home, I think _. Before_ you lose any digits.”

“My digits are fine, thank you for asking.” Tony can’t help the way he smirks on that one. It’s in his nature. “You want to check?”

Loki’s eyebrow raises, a tiny fraction, mouth twitching. “No, thank you. Now, come here.”

Tony looks at his outstretched hand. “This isn’t some elaborate plan to trick me, is it?” The _trust_ comment’s still rattling in his brain. But he needs to get home. _Loki came to find you,_ he thinks. _He could have just left you here._

Loki smiles. “If it was, would I tell you?” He beckons. “Trust me, just this once.”

“Trust _you_.” It’s a ridiculous thing to ask, and they both know it. But Tony steps closer, until Loki’s hand grips his shoulder, fingers digging in tight. On impulse, he raises his own hand, takes hold of Loki’s wrist. He can feel the tendons, taut under his fingertips, skin cool to the touch. “Only because I don’t have any other options.”

“I’d expect nothing less,” Loki says, and he tips his head slightly as he studies Tony. “I’d heard you rarely made wise decisions.”

“That’s uncalled f-” Tony goes to say, and then the world drops away.

_Black._

_Silence._

_Weightlessness._

At least this time, the void isn’t total. Loki’s there, gripping tight enough to bruise, whole figure limned in bright light. Tony tightens his grasp, scared to let go as they plunge through nothingness. There’s no air, he can’t _breathe -_

A world flickers into place around them, ground solid, covered in small pebbles, and he sucks in a gasp before it flashes out again, like a light being flicked on and off, darkness swallowing them again. Then there’s another glimpse of a world, this one densely forested. Darkness. Another world.

“What – ” Tony forces out just before the lurch out again, the drop into the void sucking the air out of his lungs. There’s another lurch as their feet touch solid ground, and this time the world resolves around them and steadies. Tony staggers, disoriented, blinking against the sudden light, and nearly treads on his suit, pieces piled at his side. Loki’s death-grip stops him falling, holding him up at the shoulder, and he slowly peels his fingers away from Loki’s wrist, white marks showing briefly before they fade from view where he was gripping so tight. Dust swirls around them like a cyclone, twisting off the ground into a spiral. They’re at the epicentre, a single calm point. The dust  starts to settle as he’s watching, leaving a blast-pattern radiating out from where they’re standing.

 He looks up. The sky’s bright, familiar blue. Cloudless. The air smells like sun-baked dirt, and after the freezing wastes of Jotunheim, the heat is stifling. Sweat breaks out across his skin. It feels good to be back.

He drops his eyes back down, and meets Loki’s gaze, face just inches from his own, eyes intent.

“Midgard,” Loki says, after a moment of staring, and lets go. Tony’s pretty sure his handprint is _dented_ into his shoulder at this point, a phantom touch lingering. “Our business is concluded.”

“Wait, hold on – ” Tony reaches as Loki turns to move away, snags his wrist again, fingers just brushing the skin. Loki pulls out of his grip, but he stops, turns back to look at him. They watch each other, a frozen tableau.

“What was that flickering?” Tony asks after a moment, squelching the question he really wants to ask. The sun reflects bright off the bronze plates of Loki’s armour, throwing a bright pattern against the pale expanse of his jawline, dancing up across his face whenever he moves.

“The paths through the worlds are not linear,” Loki says, after a long moment, his eyes scanning Tony’s face like he’s looking for something. “We traversed several of the realms on our way here. To move directly takes more energy than I can summon, especially when moving another with me.”

Tony nods, considering this. He goes to ask another question about the technicalities – _where does the energy come from? Which worlds?_ and instead, what comes out is, “Why did you help me?” It spills out of him, uncontrolled, and Loki sways back a fraction, wary, considering.

“Perhaps something in you appealed to my… _humanity_ ,” he says, still with a twist of distaste like the very idea disgusts him, half-smiling like it’s all some huge joke.

“I thought I told you threatening was more my style?” Joke for a joke. Tony rakes his eyes across the horizon. They’re in an expanse of desert, mountains ridging at the edges, shimmering in the heat. He doesn’t know where he is, but it doesn’t really matter. “Alright, if you want to remain mysterious, riddle me something else. All that stuff you said about trespassers being prosecuted or whatever. True?”

“Not entirely,” Loki says, inclining his head. “At any rate, they would likely have returned you home instead of incarcerating you.”

“Huh.” Tony looks back over at him. “So, all of this running around, hiding, and releasing war criminals was…?”

“Unnecessary,” Loki confirms. “Would you have acted differently, in my place?”

“I guess not.” Tony can feel the sun blazing down on them. God, he doesn’t even know what day it is. It was dark when he left. From the angle of the light, it feels close to midday, the light pushing down from above to drop their shadows at their feet in inky pools. “I’m not going to have all of Asgard after me for the whole prison-break thing, am I?”

Loki tips his head, considering. “I doubt it. More likely they will all be after _me._ ”

“Can’t say I blame them.” There’s an airliner making its way through the sky above them, contrail stretching ruler-straight across the blue. It’s jarringly different from the shining buildings of Asgard and the desolate waste off Jotunheim.

“When did you guess the lie?” Loki asks after a moment of silence.

“Around the time I was wallowing in my misery in a snowdrift,” Tony admits. “I mean, if Asgard’s so hot on the no-mortals thing, they seem more likely to kick me out with a warning than resort to anything more extreme. It’s not like I’d be much of a threat.”

Loki nods, like this isn’t a surprise to him.

“You know, you never answered me earlier,” Tony says, remembering the last time he and Loki were both on Earth together, of a blazing blue portal to another world and an invading army falling out of the sky.

“Earlier?” Loki’s watching the horizon too. Maybe it’s weird for him being outside again, under the light of a foreign sun.

“Yeah. Would you take another stab at taking over the world? Because I just finished the repair work on the tower.”

Loki laughs, head tipped back to expose his throat, bleached pale by the harsh light. “If I promise to spare your building, will you cease questioning?”

“Have you met me? Not going to happen.” Tony follows the line of a shadow across the arch of Loki’s cheek with his eyes, until he realises what he’s doing. Then he looks away, back up to the endless sky. “Hey, you know, I never gave you that drink, did I?”

“You did not. You were an appalling host.” Loki’s watching him, he knows, like he’s waiting for something.

“I’ll make you a trade.” Tony turns to him. They’re standing very close, he realises. He can see Loki’s hair stir in the breeze, snarling the curls further. “No more world domination, and you can cash in on that offer. Free drinks, whenever you want.”

Loki’s eyes rake over him, unreadable. “You believe a simple bargain for a _drink_ is sufficient to keep your world safe?”

“Depends. You willing to take the deal?” Tony takes the risk, holds out his hand.

“The audacity of you,” Loki says, but there’s a smile lurking.  “I accept.” He grips Tony’s hand, strong, fingers curling in tight, and they stand like that for a moment. Then Loki peels his hand away, takes a step back. “I’ll take my leave now. I don’t wish to overstay my welcome.”

“You don’t want SHIELD to show up, is what you mean.”

Loki nods in acquiescence. “It wouldn’t end well.”

“Be amusing, though.” Tony shifts, scraping his foot against the dirt below them. “Where are you going to go?”

“Wherever I choose to go,” Loki says, eyes alight, and Tony remembers _that_ feeling, the taste of freedom after so long.

“Good luck,” Tony says, and mostly means it. “Keep the chaos to a minimum, or I’ll space-proof the suit to come and kick your ass.”

“You’d go to so much effort just for me? I’m flattered,” Loki says, smiling.

“Hey, I need a project these days. Maybe I’ll do it anyway, just to check up on you.”

“Surely you’re not going to miss me?” Loki moves closer again, until the black puddles of their shadows touch, overlap.

Tony laughs. “No. But I might miss having someone to pull my ass out the fire when I send myself into another dimension.”

“Perhaps you should be a little more careful.” Loki’s close now, eyes intense, and it propels Tony, pushes him into a decision.

“I’m not good with careful,” he says, and surges forward to kiss Loki.

It’s a terrible idea, the ultimate in bad life choices, but it’s worth it just for the soft noise of surprise Loki makes, a sound that Tony swallows, smothers. Loki’s hands curve themselves against Tony’s shoulders, fingertips digging in just a little, and Tony retaliates by twisting a hand into Loki’s hair. It’s softer than he’d have expected, and he tangles it between his fingers as he pushes closer, stepping up until they’re chest to chest, tipping his head to the side. Loki hums softly, and slides his tongue past Tony’s lips. Tony’s free hand moulds itself to the shape of Loki’s jaw, palm against his neck. He shuts his eyes. Loki curls a hand around the back of his neck, holding him in, close. It’s not an elegant kiss, but it’s _good._ Loki’s mouth is hot, firm against his, and the way his tongue brushes against Tony’s is just the right side of rough. Tony can feel Loki’s heartbeat through his chest. He pushes back, nips at his lips, uses his grip on Loki to shift even closer, trapping them together, until they’re pressed tight, breathing in a rhythm, impossibly close, hands clinging tight to each other.

And Tony’s phone rings.

It’s shatteringly loud, ringtone set so he can hear it when he’s working, and it startles him so much that he jumps back, breaks the kiss, dropping his hands away from Loki. He scrambles the phone out of the internal pocket of his bodysuit just as it rings out.

“Your people will be looking for you,” Loki says, voice a little rough. Tony looks up at him; he looks dishevelled, hair even wilder, eyes dark. “I should go.”

“You can’t just – ” _You can’t just leave like that._

“I have to.” He steps back, puts some distance between them. “Goodbye.” He starts to fade from view, dissolving away like a mirage. Just before he disappears, he smiles. “Remember our deal, Tony.”

And he’s gone, image vanished, leaving Tony alone in a wide expanse of desert. He watches the space where Loki was for a moment, then turns back to his phone. SHIELD will be looking for him.

 

* * *

 

He doesn’t make it back to Stark Tower for two days, tied up in red tape and medical tests and damage control with the press. He apologises to Pepper for dumping the company on her, apologises for making her worry, because even though their break up was _painfully_ public, they’ve stayed close. He has a shouting match with Fury when he discovers the SHIELD agents that collected him ‘accidentally’ handed his dimension-jumper over to SHIELD’s research department. He checks in with the other Avengers, and lies through his teeth about where he’s been, how he got home. Even when he gets back to the tower, he’s tied up in things to do. He says hello to JARVIS, and the bots, and sets a diagnostic running on the wreckage of the suit. The next one will be able to handle space just fine. Just in case.

He takes a moment – once everything’s running along on automatic and he’s dug out an old suit to act as a replacement – to just walk through the tower, surveying the completed building work, breathing in the smell of new paint. They’ve only finished the repairs recently, and it’s still a novelty to see smooth plaster and unbroken plate glass, instead of dust, rubble, and hanging plastic sheeting. He strolls over to the bar to sample some of what it’s been restocked with, and that’s when he sees it.

A piece of paper, thick, expensive looking. He flips it over.

 _You still owe me a drink,_ reads the note.

He smiles.

**Author's Note:**

> As always, comments are much appreciated :) And also, my apologies for the fact it took over a year for me to make it back into the frostiron fold. At least I did return... eventually!


End file.
